The point I was going for was that if we (and by we I mean computer and electronics engineers who I am not one of) can't universally get behind and help improve a standard with the stated goal of being a universal interface then what hope is there of such a universal standard evolving naturally? None, I say: there will always be the competition, the firewires, the thunderbolts, that do things different because the standard hasn't caught up yet and they are impatient or because they actively refuse to join the universal standard.

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the problem is that the goalposts are always moving. how can you design THE connector when the technology it connects gets faster, requires more wires due to extra signals etc. but the most impossible part of the equation is that the companies developing and using these connectors dont stick to the "standard" i have only one device that has USB type C connector. its a HP elite X2 . the USB type C port is the charging port as well as thunderbolt etc.. no charger other than the HP one will work. why? because HP didnt follow the standard. they designed it so that only their charger works. customers complained so much about this that in the X3 version they did follow the std.

Should we start a survey, "count your usb chargers/devices" (seeing the adoption rate of usb-c by "geeks", would be interesting).

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It's not about chargers really; all of my chargers and batteries currently output via a USB-A port, and even an old USB2.0 USB-A port is capable of the more modern charge methods such as higher voltages and current supplies if the charger supports new enough USB power delivery. USB-C does permit faster data transfer because it has extra wires, but doesn't change the power delivery characteristics, so are unlikely to appear on chargers any time soon, especially in isolation without being an adjunct to USB-A ports. Also, I've already seen plenty of USB cables with very little copper in that are overly resistive and also fail over a few months as the resistivity and thinness of the copper basically makes them slow release fuses.

But USB-C devices might be an interesting question. Or perhaps how many USB-C cables you own, either end or both.

Completly useless discussion here again. I was on a trip in April with four other guys. I had a old tablet with me and my mobile. I forgot my micro-usb cable for the tablet. Non of the guys had a micro-usb cable with them. All had usb-c. So what does personal experience count if you hit the market with something new? Nothing. Since more than two years, every new device has usb-c. The approx. lifespan of gadgets are about two to four years. So in two years from now on 95% of all techstuff will have usb-c.

Umm, there are a lot, and I mean a lot, of current devices on the market with a full sized USB B connector. There is even a full sized USB 3 B connector to accommodate faster data transfer rates. Still the regular old connector that is only compatible with up to USB 2 devices is commonplace on current printers, scanners, and external sound cards (none of which really need faster than USB 2 speeds). I have mostly seen the full sized USB 3 B connectors on drive enclosures/caddies, some of which use a micro USB 3 connector instead. I've also seen this connector on a touchscreen.

If you want to point out a truly obscure USB port, it would be mini USB A, which I've never seen in real life other than the combination mini USB A/B port on the Pandora (that is, it would support either connector).

Oddly, the newest devices I've seen with mini USB B connectors are portable external DVD ROM drives, some of which are still sold new with this port. Mini USB B is much closer to extinction than full sized USB B.

I have one peripheral device that uses USB C (and its full sized USB A to USB C wire is the only USB C wire I have; the only other USB C cable I've actually seen in real life was a USB C to full sized USB 3 B connector for an external drive caddy, which came with a full sized USB A to full sized USB 3 B cable as well). Other than that, I've seen a USB C port on a couple of new ultra-thin laptops and on the current model of micro desktops which we deploy at work, which also have several full sized USB A connectors.

Umm, there are a lot, and I mean a lot, of current devices on the market with a full sized USB B connector.

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It's way more reliable and sturdy than the Standard-A plug as well, it's seriously fucked up that they ended up using the fragile end of the device cables for the PC. I'd seriously like to know what they were thinking. But who am I talking about... "Hey look, we made the next generation of jacks way more reliable!" - "Wait, are these SMD only...?"

If you want to point out a truly obscure USB port, it would be mini USB A, which I've never seen in real life other than the combination mini USB A/B port on the Pandora (that is, it would support either connector).

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Mini-USB A has a very dedicated purpose: It is designed to be used for OTG devices. The whole OTG thing reverses the server-client role and this plug was supposed to prevent that you end up trying to connect a client-client combination. You can commonly find it on the OTG adapters that allow you to connect a device with a Standard-A plug to the Mini-USB jack of the Pandora.

Talking about USB cables and new standards, I remember people soldering in a micro-USB into a NDS so you could charge it with non Nintendo chargers. One site that explained it(long gone since youtube because popular) mentioned that mini usb also could be swapped for micro and the author of this tutorial had done that to a lot of his devices just to eliminate the need for mini usb cables. Is this the same for USB C? If there is no C specific circuitry does the the device supplying the power just supply the standard USB micro/mini power? If so are the solder points the same for USB C like they are between mini and micro? It would be could if this was the case, then I could replace all my devices with USB-C

USB-C has a hell of a lot more lines, even if you discount those duplicated to enable the rotation symmetry of the port, so I strongly suspect it has a very different pinout to previous ports.

And yes, USB-C does not depend on having any particular version of USB-Power-delivery, so it can be supplied with just 5V at 100mA and be happy with it, provided it does not identify as a high power device. That said, I've no chargers or ports I've yet found that don't just pump out the maximum the client will electrically accept at 5V.

Ah that stinks, I thought it was cool how they made mini and micro interchangeable on the solder points. I guess it wouldn't make sense on USB-C though as mini and micro were the same speed and C is a lot faster. Still going to replace the mini USB on my bike lights with micro. My Zoom H1 uses mini as well but not to recharge just to pull the audio files from which is painfully slow so I just eject the sd card to pull them off of anyway. This will get rid of at least one cord. . .

Completly useless discussion here again. I was on a trip in April with four other guys. I had a old tablet with me and my mobile. I forgot my micro-usb cable for the tablet. Non of the guys had a micro-usb cable with them. All had usb-c. So what does personal experience count if you hit the market with something new? Nothing. Since more than two years, every new device has usb-c. The approx. lifespan of gadgets are about two to four years. So in two years from now on 95% of all techstuff will have usb-c.

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Wow..don't tell my electronics that. The newest computers i have are 10+ years old. My phone is usually at least 4+ years old...

the problem i had with USB-c is that depending on the device it can use a 45W+ charger. my HP elite X2 required 15V 3A to charge. qualcom quickcharge specs have 5V 3A , 9V 3A , 12V 3A , 15V 3A. also 20V 3A there are type A and B only type B do the 15 V and 20V.. this changes too fast .. i just read that with USB PD (power distribution) 100W is max over USB type C quick charge cables...